pleased to have you with us your party today all researchers. coming up on our t.v. new information comes out about an american fighting for the islamic state and he's not the only western are fighting for their cause we'll take a look at the group's recruitment tactics and how many more may be taking up weapons for isis. and a bola in africa we are tracking the virus as it's claimed more lives and continues to spread more on that coming up. plus of grassroots efforts to help the town of ferguson missouri through the power of music we speak with the organizers of a new benefit concert that comes days after a massive protests over the police shooting of an unarmed teen more on that later in the show.

it's wednesday august twenty seventh eight pm in washington d.c. i'm lynn neary david and you're watching r.t. america an american man believed to have been killed in syria was there to fight alongside a terrorist group most likely the islamic state formally known as isis he was thirty three year old douglas macarthur mccain originally from san diego according to an activists linked to the free syrian army which saw his body mccain was among three foreign jockeys fighting with isis who died during the battle u.s. law enforcement and intelligence officials have long expressed concern about foreign fighters joining hard line jihad as in syria as tim is very but most suspect the numbers of fighters with western passports is in the thousands more than one hundred are thought to be americans officials have expressed concern that . radicalized foreign fighters could one day import those influences once they

return home in fact just last week federal authorities urged law enforcement across the country to be alert for possible attacks inside the u.s. in a joint bulletin the department of homeland security and the f.b.i. said because of the individual nature of the radicalization process it is difficult to predict triggers that will contribute to homegrown violent extremists attempting acts of violence they went on to say that offenders present law enforcement with limited opportunities to detect and disrupt plots to discuss this i was joined earlier by jake villa berto the iraq war veteran and doctoral researcher at the university of birmingham in the u.k. i first asked him to talk about what's driving americans to join radical groups like isis. well i think there is two components of this that stand out most particularly the first is you need to see the foreigners are joining insurgent

groups are doing out of a feeling of connectivity a desire to give up their lives and sacrifice for something else isis as it stands is not necessarily something that's directly related to american as an isis is a form of standing up for islamic extremism or fundamentalist sort of islamic belief so when you see these foreigners coming to join isis it's a more out of a passion and extreme desire to stand up for that fundamental extremists and have an outlet to express that and also simultaneously the second component of that is being able to not just simply express a religious faith but express a religious faith and demonstrate political power and political control that which is similar in any other combat whether it's in the streets of chicago gang warfare or it's in a battle the border of america and mexico with the drug cartels and the american

political control it's an outlet for an individual to express control and it's an outlet to express a religious affiliation of a religious belief even if it is manipulated by some form of extremism indeed it always goes back to power well we know that isis has quite the public the department can you talk about some of the techniques that they used to really recruit people so what we've seen since the development of isis as a and as an organization this is post their fall out of the syrian breakup with isis and. isis has an extraordinary online presence this isn't geodes chat rooms this is a twitter this is with every form of social media young people who are technologically savvy can access these chat rooms they oftentimes change their names they change their identities and it's a form. of sort of social and entrepreneurial phenomenon in which people get to

share ideas and they get to do it in a way that as someone sitting in a home they're able to sympathize become emotionally attached much in the same way if somebody were to have private spiritual life in their home it's the same way but however it's it's a connecting a religious belief and a political orientation a movement to support isis finds its foreign supporters by first making a connectivity a social connection but then allowing that connectivity to fester and metastasized into action and that's why isis wants young people to do across the world and the u.s. is clearly concerned about these fighters coming back here last week that the h.s. and the f.b.i. urge law enforcement across the country to be alert of possible attacks yet officials say they have no evidence of any specific threat so how concerned should we be that we're going to see domestic terrorism well we need to make clear two components of the first is whether isis wants to strike the united states or not is

not something that we have seen besides a few anecdotal pictures a few anecdotal remarks on online chat rooms that isn't what you would call a social movement like we've saw from osama bin laden during the one nine hundred ninety s. were there was a series of strikes made against the united states. embassy the u.s.s. cole in the one nine hundred eighty three world trade center bombing as well so we haven't seen that sort of overall coherent strategy push forth that doesn't mean it's not coming so in order to basically put it put a cap stone and say we know a strike is coming we only know a strike is coming so far is that what we can see what isis done in so far isis is shown a regional interests a localized interest not so much a global interest that doesn't mean it's not coming but it hasn't been as forthright and planned coherently as bin laden. did during the one nine hundred ninety s. to what i find so interesting is that these young men and women are even targeting

muslims pacifically sunny muslims and a lot of people don't quite understand that isis is actually comprised mostly of sunday muslims that shocks me because when i think about the group i think of more you know targeting western interests so does this say that this group is just so much bigger. than what we've seen in the past is it just go beyond you know the original stated goals of some other terrorist groups well i wish we had more time to good talk at length about the diversity and the political ideology within the different sunni insurgent groups and how that relates to isis and what i can do is simply narrow it down and say the reason isis is targeting sunni communities generally is because the same reason that we see we saw under. mr khouri target sunni's it is the lack of political power in the region and the need to demonstrate and take over power the way that you do take over power if you're an insurgent organization of the people they don't agree with you get rid of the

people who don't agree with you yes but it's also whoever's got the strongest gun whoever's got the biggest gun is the one that will maintain power and this is not nothing new. about this centuries ago and this is the same type of experience you see anywhere in the world where there is not political power reason isis taking the actions because they want political power and they want to demonstrate control society and to glassy a lot of people with back on this and say you know this is the obama administration this should have been addressed earlier before spiraling out of control in your mind is there anything the administration could have done to prevent from this you know from seeing happen what's going on right now with this this sort of remarks that are coming in and out of washington or are reigning just anti obama isms without any real code. it's the reason that isis exists today and such a powerful strong format is because in two thousand and nine at the end of the u.s.

counterinsurgency campaign there was a failure to develop a long term coherent political plan that incorporated all elements of of iraqi society that was able to make long term sustained political peace building from the bottom up and we have cheap temporary successes and what we did when we defeat it well when the sunni's defeated al qaeda in two thousand and nine we essentially pushed them into the into the countryside push them into latency but that actually didn't get rid of the problem which was. all tribal differences political different ideologies and what that this task of sizing has now brought about isis to be more vitriolic more powerful and more dangerous than anything we've ever seen in iraq in the last decade that indeed are a jake deliberate iraq war veteran and doctoral researcher at the university of birmingham in the u.k. thanks for weighing in on that they are much. now the latest in ukraine moscow is planning to further provide humanitarian aid to the people of donetsk and luhansk

that's what russian president vladimir putin told german chancellor angela merkel in a phone conversation today that your side discussed the results of the customs union member states meeting that took place in the capital of bella roups but the focus of media attention was of course on the first one on one meeting between putin and his ukrainian counterpart petro poroshenko artie's i read has the details. is the first ever between the current president of russia and ukraine and just your own leuchars hopes would herald some kind of breakthrough. talks went well but insisted the most pressing issue finding a solution to the conflict in ukraine was simply kiev needs to settle but if you go it in that it should we didn't talk to detail about it and frankly speaking. russia can propose any conditions for a cease fire or speak about possible agreements between kiev and donetsk or lugansk

this is ukraine's affairs we can only try to help to create an atmosphere of trust during these negotiations that are in my view very necessary. to have something that is becoming a problem because the humanitarian catastrophe cities of them is going the guns hundreds of thousands of refugees are fleeing for safety many coming over the border where there was real movement was in discussions over the gas dispute between the two countries which in promise to negotiations will be started in the future because it's a problem which affects the e.u. just as much as it does. the russian president was all smiles ahead of the one on one. the ukrainian leaders betrayed the fact he was probably a little less relaxed ahead of talks with a lot riding on them. it was a day of tough negotiations but the logic of the peace plan was supported by heads of state which ultimately though no real breakthrough came in attempts to end the

bloody struggle in ukraine but after the events of recent months just the fact the leaders are talking is some kind of progress in the goes r.t. minsk. as the warring parties fight for control of donetsk in eastern ukraine the country's largest chemical plant and going three thousand people has been hit with missiles landing close to pipelines and storage tanks are policy clear has an inside look at the damage. around one of the largest factories in ukraine of chemicals and coal and as you can see it has come under shelling you can actually still smell in the air this smell of burning and there's also the constant fear that at any moment now the ukrainian military will shell again we're trying at least to get to the center of donetsk because here it is too dangerous. to show for just let me show you where. this is what is left of the show. but others

fear another channel could be on the horizon that in its krege and has nearly four thousand dangerous factories and facilities to hit on any one of them would pose a tweet to the entire area and indiscriminate punishment to find his and civilians alike we're talking about are those who go away degraded in the atmosphere. because we're talking about here which should be chlorine related. or. risks in most of these cases will be short programs. ways or dense nearby the plants are not taking any chances it's been more dangerous here since the morning when it was some houses have been hit on the edge of the neighborhood this is part of a ruckus that was fired from a grad in the song launch more and more these are landing here in civilian areas of course the r t. eastern ukraine. as the

a ball of death toll continues to rise across west africa and unprecedented number of medical aid workers are themselves falling ill with the disease artie's mellotron brings us an update and there's a growing epidemic among the very people meant to treat it. with more than twenty six hundred people infected and over four hundred deaths the recent a bull epidemic has now claimed the life of another doctor leading the fight against it dr starr rogers a prominent position in sierra leone contracted the disease most likely through contact while treating his patients just a week prior to his death dr rogers gave an interview to a local paper where he stressed the importance of hygiene as a means to prevent the spread of ebola dr rogers is only one of the medical professionals treating a bullet to have died of the disease themselves now just a few days before dr rogers death a doctor in liberia dr abraham bora-bora fell ill with ebola and he was treated

with the experimental drugs remap the same drug that was given to the two americans who recovered from the virus dr kent brantly and nancy rightful while there is no known cure for the disease their recovery raised hopes that the drug could help the two americans were released from emory university hospital last week both having been the first humans to be treated with the map for dr borger his treatment apparently failed he later died following dizzy map treatment and london and germany are also seeing their first cases of ebola two health care workers have been transported out of western africa where they contracted the disease each have now been repatriated to their respective countries for treatment now all in all the world health organization is reporting that about two hundred forty health care workers in total across liberia sierra leone and guinea have fallen ill and more than half have died from ebola and now with this growing threat to health care

workers canada is now evacuating up to three hundred medical aid workers from various western african nations so if this contagion among medical professionals continue who will be left to care for the sick in west africa from washington manila chan r.t. . more water shutoffs are coming to people who are behind on their bills in detroit this comes as a moratorium on the shutting off of water expired earlier this week right now nearly forty five percent of the city's home water accounts are past due after detroit filed the largest municipal bankruptcy in the nation's history despite claims from some that water shutoffs should be seen as human rights violations thousands of those who are sixty days mine on their bills or own more than one hundred fifty dollars have had their access to water cut disconnections are still going on in the city but thousands of customers have agreed to new payment plans so

they can continue to pay off their balance and have access to clean drinking water only ten percent of pastor balances are required to enter the payment plan that's down from thirty percent before according to the u.s. census bureau detroit is one of the poorest cities in the nation with thirty eight percent living below poverty line. here in washington d.c. a group of activists gathered to call on attorney general eric holder to help secure justice for michael brown and the people of ferguson demonstrators at the event which took place at the justice department also called for an end to police brutality and ferguson saw a similar demonstration last night with more than one hundred people marching don the life of eighteen year old michael brown and encourage the community to heal it comes after more than two weeks of protests over the shooting death of brown by a ferguson police officer but that commemoration is not only taking the form of

protests tonight in new york city hip hop activist group rebel dia's is holding a benefit concert to raise money and awareness on the issue it's a cause it's very close to home for the members of the group not too long ago they joined at the protests with residents of ferguson and got some rare insight into michael brown's family after those events front man rudra govan made us known as rob stars wrote an op ed about that experience called the ten important observations to know about ferguson to discuss this i was drawing to earlier by the members themselves ron stars and gonzalo winning us also known as g one i first asked g one to talk about what compelled them to drive the seventeen hours from new york to ferguson. well to see the images of these young people in ferguson demanding justice for michael brown was very inspiring for us were based in the bronx and in the south bronx we had our own michael brown our own trayvon martin

his name is ramadi graham who was murdered in his own home in front of his grandmother and his little brother a couple of years ago in the bronx to this day the officer that killed him richard hastings not been brought to justice it's a struggle that we were very much involved with in building with the family of ramadi graham in the bronx and so when this happened for us we really felt the need to express solidarity with the community in ferguson and with michael brown family also our collective in the south bronx has a personal connection to michael brown family. also was a member of our collective grew up with michael brown's cousin and so also was very much a personal thing to be able to go and build and express solidarity with michael brown family. to you said one of the things that struck you during your visit with michael brown's family was their view of brown's final action before his death can you talk about what they meant by that. michael brown's final action

i think showed a lot about his character and we want to talk about this because you know the media's been assassinating his character and more than anything he was a selfless show that he was a selfless man what he did is basically he told other friend that he was with dorian to run and then he turned around and surrendered and put his hands up which is why you know all the young men in ferguson have been you know doing the hands of don't shoot as a way of just saying you know like that the young people are being murdered but the act that he committed was that i think it says a lot about his character he was a young man that was supposed to start college the monday after he was killed you know and more there was that the family was showing you know a different side of things that that's that's really nice to get put out there is that is that mike brown was a good kid you know he was the family called the mike mike the gentle giant and you know he was an innocent kid that was murdered by. their wills and is still free and

he won when it comes to the media do you think that there was a conscious effort to characterize michael brown in a certain way or do you think he was portrayed that way just by default. absolutely absolutely the media is trying to assassinate his character for example the video you have this bogus video that comes out. and this video is based on nothing because what happens is that there was never a nine one one call to talk about a robbery because a strong armed robbery didn't happen you know when the police stopped michael brown there was no knowledge of anything that had gone on in the store i think it says a lot you know just to understand is they now make people that live in new york people that live in cities with this bodega that you have that relationship or just or there was never a robbery that may have been in a disagreement but there was never a robbery there was never a call and more or less of the adult think that we we have a problem with it and it was this nation's moral compass they were even having a discussion about whether you know the fact that somebody potentially did or did

not steal some cigarillos deserves the death penalty necessarily what occurred it was an execution of a young black man and it go the test it's a testament to the fact that in this nation there. are undervalued devalued and becoming just a variable in an equation for profit unfortunately what we're seeing and one of the things that you also talked about in an op ed was outside agitators it was going by authorities picked up by the media of course as well about people infiltrating ferguson from elsewhere to stir up commotion and by that definition it could have included both of you here from new york why did you make of that distinction. i think that we have to be clear that social movement has historically had outside agitators and infiltrators from the cointelpro and stuff like that so we have to

understand that that the enemy is always going to have that be a part of it but i think that in this case there was also i think you know an over and for some the focus put on outside agitators which i think is also a tactic to take away value from an uprising of young black people and young poor people i think that that's that's that's a that's a key thing that we have to differentiate we wouldn't even be here right now or even be having this conversation about ferguson if those young people hadn't responded the way that they did you know in two thousand and fourteen you know the government the state has a monopoly on violence and i think that just the fact that people are even talking about this response when you compare that to the police terrorism and a military occupation of a town that they were responding to or even as simple as a police murder of one of their friends i think that that's that's when you start walking you know a fine line which is something dangerous i think that for example you know the so-called leaders of al sharpton have dictated a narrative that pits the good protester versus the bad protester and i think that

that's a dangerous it's a dangerous narrative to really take part in when what we would end up doing is that it takes away the rights or almost you know it devalues the right of young people to resist the system and i think that what happened in ferguson is a tipping point in which young people you know the young man that i met i was fifteen years old that's only you know i was i was nine years old when obama became president what polls were polled racial america talking about mean or even young man who's who talked about you know they killed trayvon last year and they get away with it they killed ramadi graham in the bronx and they get away with it how do i know that i'm not next so i think the main point they were trying to make with that is that you know the there was a young rebellion that happened and i think that we need to understand. that was a response the main thing we should be talking about that this was a response to police murder to police terrorism and a military occupation of a town of twenty thousand people so you know definitely a very very good one down there

a very good point to make indeed unfortunately we run out of time wish i could talk to you both some more but the benefit concert is tonight in new york city best of luck roger govan a dozen gonzalo been a guest of the group thank you thank you. and before we go don't forget to tune in at nine pm for larry king mountain i guess is country musician jay cohen here he is talking to larry about how he got his start. true about the shoulder injury and khalid's responsible for the taking of the kids are very true you know what you are not you it's florida state right i want to floor state i was i wanted to play golf there on the golf team was in a walk on much one brother had a full ride there in tennis that's another offers to play a smaller schools but want to be a punchline rather so i went there and ironically enough had a at a shoulder strap surgery after an accident water skiing and i don't know if that was the reason i started up except it's our but i know that. it was like

a way that my life told me that maybe it's good supposed to take a different path so this is you have to be nineteen twenty years old i was nineteen twenty years old had you son before at all in the shower in the car i remember when rather as promised is honest truth is i'm never forget it just kind of singing along to a song and my brother are sit in the back seat of the car loans and he's like mom you should like do something with jake because i think you can sing ok i'm never good. but that was early i was young like ten eleven years old. so tune in at nine pm tonight here on our team america. that does it for now for more on the stories we covered go to youtube dot com slash r t america check out our web site r t dot com slash usa follow me on twitter and i'm married david for now have a great night i'm happy martin are the stories we cover here we're not going to hear any right other big stories that have to do that while they talk there is a reason they don't want you to not ever put their offerings that you think we.

know let's break the set. remember that u.s. drone strike in yemen back in december that military officials have defended and insisted that no civilians were killed them well documents obtained by a human rights organization called reprise indicate that in may of this year some yemenis received more than a million dollars combined in compensation and first family members who were injured or killed in the exact same drone strike the payments are important to say the least for two reasons the first reason is that the payments confirm the fact

that yemeni civilians were indeed killed in that u.s. drone strike despite what military officials like to say along with other details that previous documents reveal the identities of some of the civilians who were killed among them was a twenty nine year old man who was an associate of an organization working to curb islamised militancy the second phase in the payments are so important is because they're so large yemen is among the poorest of nations in the middle east and yet here the yemeni government has a how over a million dollars to victims of one drone strike gregory johnsen an expert on yemen who investigated the strike and payouts went on record as saying it's extremely unlikely that yemen would be even able to make such large payments on its own and that's led many experts to believe that they knew was might actually be behind the pavements made to the victims in the drone strike that the military doesn't want to

admit killed civilians it's not outrageous to think the u.s. is secretly behind these payments either as it's. common practice for the u.s. to issue what it calls salacious payments to compensate victims for errant strikes as if the money makes it all ok for instant according to a twenty thirteen pro publica report the u.s. paid out almost a million dollars to victims in afghanistan but that was over the course of a full year and covered many strikes unlike the case of the recent yemeni payout which is outrageous is that anyone in the u.s. military would contend that no civilians were killed when officials at the cia have even admitted that civilians were probably killed what is outrageous is caitlin hayden spokeswoman for the national security council insisting that i'm calling civilians noncombatant in her e-mail statements about the yemeni payments as if that intentional switch of words somehow raise.